


Overdue

by Anonymous



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Dean Finally Says It, Dean Winchester to the Rescue, Hurt Castiel, Hurt/Comfort, Love Confessions, M/M, Non-Consensual Bondage
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-02
Updated: 2018-12-02
Packaged: 2019-09-05 16:23:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 973
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16814206
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: It shouldn’t take Cas getting kidnapped, beaten up and tortured for Dean to say it.But it does.





	Overdue

The old barn looked like it’d take a gentle breeze to knock it over. Dean didn’t know if it had looked like that before Cas got ambushed by demons, or if it was the result of their battle, and he didn’t care.

He drew his gun and the demon killing knife and ran inside, keeping to the wall, just in case there were any black eyed sons of bitches left standing.

There weren’t. The floor was littered with eyeless corpses, and Dean wondered how desperate Cas had to be to let rip with such a blast of power. Especially when it meant killing the hosts. Especially when all angels were low on Grace because of the situation in Heaven.

He found out.

Cas was in a stall at the back of the barn. There was a iron cuff fastened around one wrist, and Dean could see it had burned his skin. The chain was fastened to a hook on the wall, cemented in.

The angel was a mess. He’d been beaten; one eye was half shut, and blood was smeared across his jaw. But that wasn’t the worst of it.

His shirt was stained with blood, torn open in places, and Dean could see the gleam of grace from open wounds.

He started forward, but his foot kicked something and when he looked down he wanted to be sick.

It was one of those devices Crowley had used to crack open Samandriel, and that Hannah and her cohorts had used on Cas to get him to reveal where he and Sam were, and what Cas knew about the darkness.

No wonder Cas had taken no prisoners. 

Dean kicked it again, so it vanished into the darkness (he’d grab it later when Cas was nowhere near it) and then dropped to his knees in front of the angel.

It took a moment to draw Cas out of wherever he was. He looked like he was in shock, but then he realised Dean was in front of him and he started to shake.

“Dean.”

Dean rested his hand on the back of Cas’s neck, drew him forward so he could rest his forehead against Cas’s own.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m here, Cas. Let’s get you out of here, buddy.”

++

All Cas needed was time. Sam told him so, once he’d finished helping Dean stitch up Cas’s wounds, to give his Grace a helping hand. 

Some rest and the angel would be fine.

But Dean wasn’t.

He couldn’t stop thinking about that device now safely secreted away in a locked room of the dungeon. It felt like a betrayal having it in Cas’s home, but better there where no one could get at it, than left in the barn where it might eventually find its way into the hands of someone who knew what it was.

He’d come so close to losing Cas. Either the demons would have drilled in too deep and killed him, or they’d have reset Cas completely.

He might have gotten Cas back as a stranger, or a damaged, broken angel that needed 24/7 care for the rest of his life.

And Dean would have done that. He’d have quit hunting and found a way to live as long as Cas did, a spell, something, and been there to look after him.

Even if the Cas who’d returned to him was a total stranger, Dean would have found a way to make it right. To fix Cas.

How could he do anything less? When he…. He loved him.

It shouldn’t take Cas almost dying, or being hurt so badly he faced an existence of being dependent on others, or having his mind wiped of any recollection of them, of anything, for Dean to admit it.

It wasn’t fair to Cas, who Dean had long suspected felt as he did, to think he was on his own in this. Or to wait, and wait, and each day feel a little more like he would be waiting forever.

Cas deserved better. He deserved Dean to be telling him all of this when he _wasn’t_ laid up, but that meant more waiting and Dean was done with putting him through that.

He got up and went into Cas’s room, knocking once, lightly. But Cas was awake, and somehow he knew it was Dean and told him to come in.

Dean found Cas sitting up, the only light coming from the bedside lamp, staring into space.

“Hey.” He came over, and pulled the blanket up around the angel a little more. “How are you?”

Cas turned to him. The bruising was going down, slowly; another day or so and Cas would be healed, and mobile.

He didn’t answer.

So not the time to be doing this, but Dean felt like it was now or never.

“Cas...Look, I should have told you this long before now. I don’t know why I didn’t.”

A half lie. He did, he supposed, but he couldn’t put it into words, and there were only three now that were important. Everything else could hold.

“But I’m going to now. Cas, I love you.”

Cas stared at him. The silence grew, and Dean wondered if maybe (and wouldn’t that be hilarious) he’d been fretting over how to tell an angel he loved him, worrying he was hurting the angel by not being able to say it, when all along the angel didn’t love him.

That would be a typical showing of Winchester luck.

And then Cas reached out for his hand. “Dean,” he said, and then he didn’t seem able to say anymore.

Maybe Dean wasn’t the only one who had trouble with words sometimes. 

He leaned in carefully, wary of Cas’s injuries, and kissed him gently. When Cas was well, there’d be time for more, but right now, this was enough.


End file.
